350,000 public sector job cuts warned

Tuesday, 16 June 2009 10:02

As many as 350,000 public sector jobs could be lost in the next year years leading to mass strikes and civil unrest, it was warned today.

The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) reports as a future government looks to balance the books from the borrowing costs of the recession, public sector jobs may have to be cut.

Next year some 30,000 job cuts are predicted in local authorities.

John Philpott, CIPD chief economist, said: "Cuts on this scale would still leave the public sector workforce bigger than it was when Gordon Brown became chancellor of the exchequer in 1997, leaving ample scope for a new government of whatever hue to take an even bigger axe to public sector jobs after the General Election.

"The impending 'age of austerity' means that the greater job security and relative generous pay and pensions packages enjoyed by public sector workers will soon be a thing of the past."

He added: "What makes the public sector workforce different. is the much higher rate of union members. As a result the coming era of public sector austerity might not only witness large scale job cuts but also an ongoing 'workplace guerrilla war' marked by waves of major public sector strikes and regular bouts of unrest."

Mr Philpot claimed one brake on this possibility could be the loss of public sympathy for those in public sector jobs "further exacerbated by a growing awareness of the huge gulf between generous public sector pensions and private sector pension schemes that have been squeezed and in many cases closed".

He added public sector job cuts will have a knock-on effect on the private sector unless the economy is strong enough to see renewed job creation.

Shadow chancellor George Osborne has already started to push the prospect of spending cuts onto the agenda.

In the Times yesterday, he wrote: "We should have the confidence to tell the public the truth that Britain faces a debt crisis; that existing plans show that real spending will have to be cut, whoever is elected.

"The bills of rising unemployment and the huge interest costs of a soaring national debt mean that many government departments will face budget cuts."

Speaking on Sky News, schools secretary Ed Balls said: "We're going to have to
make some tough choices.

"We are determined to keep the money flowing to every area in the country."

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